The Yokai Realm - Act 2: The Path of Self Discovery

Opening

The session opens on Kate and Yokai Moki at the dinner in the Yokai realm. Kate finally meets Yokai Moki and hugs her.

Yokai Moki points out that Moki is still dead, and glares at Azami, who grins smugly back.

Yokai Moki is informed that she's in the yokai realm with Kate in spirit because it costs a lot of energy to transfer people into the yokai realm, so they were taken in spirit.

They're also informed that Azami has the ability to cut through anything. Thus, they cut Moki in two using a special sword which can separate her.

They wait for the person who can give all the answers.

Eventually they see a man in a black striped Yukata come down the stairs. He is attended by the porcelain knight that guided Kate to this banquet. He has red eyes. This is Bami.

Instead of taking his place at the head of the table and continues walking towards the group. On seeing Moki, he asks her to switch out as there has been a mistake. Moki says she doesn't know if she can because her other half is effectively dead.

Bami pulls a paintbrush out from his clothes and paints what she feels as a Yin-yang symbol on her forehead. Magic in the symbol activates and regular Moki arrives beside her Yokai form.

Yokai Moki asks if it hurt when they were split. She replies yes. Bami and Hitomi glare at Azami.

Bami then asks about Moki and what might've set her off to split. She tells Bami of Skab getting crushed, causing her to curse. He says that might be a catalyst, but that shouldn't be enough to split them. Moki then mentions the vial of white liquid.

Bami finds this curious as that would only be possible through the blood of a yokai. Which cannot be sustained in the material plane. This means what she drank may or may not be the blood of a yokai. Bami also mentions that there is likely negative energy involved due to the curses. And they'll need to effectively fight it to clear it.

Bami and Hitomi will be performing the ritual to split yokai Moki to remove the negative part of her. Both Moki's are taken upstairs by Hitomi and Bami.

Kate is also told that Azami wishes to have words with her outside the dining hall.

Kate

She exits through the door and enters a pitch black room. She feels around the wall, slips, and falls into the wall. Kate tries to navigate the darkness and hears a tinging sound. She tries to move towards the tinging, eventually approaching light. She continues to the light and finds herself in a dugout at a baseball field. She looks out and sees Azami in full baseball gear batting against an automated pitching machine. Kate asks "Why baseball?" to which she responds that her idiot husband wanted it.

With the next ball that flies toward her, Azami hits it with enough force to explode the ball. Azami's glare is redirected to Kate, and she calls her out onto to the field. Azami was told no violence, and she tells Kate that she picked something with no violence.

She then tells Kate to take her sword and try to smite her. Kate uses a wrathful smite. In a split moment she puts her full swing into it. Azami catches it, and Kate feels a thread snaps, and that her pact has been paused. Her smite is cancelled and Azami takes her sword and pokes Kate with the bat.

Kate is told that numerous people have been killed in the same position she's in right now. And to show some respect to them.

Azami takes Kate's sword and rubs it on the inside of her elbow, cleaning it, which reveals the sword as a jagged edge greatsword. She holds it in one hand, and in her other, the shard of excalibur that was inside it. She then asks about which she'd like to learn about.

Kate picks to learn about the shard. Azami smiles and seems pleased at this. She returns to sword to Kate who feels her pact resume.

Moki

The Moki's are taken to a room upstairs which looks like it was crafted for a fight. Moki asks if they've done anything like this before. Which the answer for _shiftlings_ is no.

Bami asks the Mokis to prepare tea. Regular Moki makes black tea with milk. Yokai Moki makes an Earl Grey with honey. Bami has them prepare another as he finds that Moki's is not hot enough, Yokai Moki's is too sweet. They do, and find that Moki's is too hot, Yokai Moki's is not sweet enough. A third cup is placed, which he says is just cold.

A third Moki reveals herself, critical of the other two.

She questions why they're wasting their time making tea She also says she's the one responsible for making sure that the two of them are still breathing. Yokai Moki responds that's her job.

Kate

Kate is still being stared down by Azami with the shard of excalibur in her hand. She asks if she knows what the shard even is. Kate responds that she knows it's a part of a bigger whole. Azami mentions that there's a reason why it's split. She also asks why Kate carries it. Kate responds that she was carrying it in hopes of finding someone who's better equipped to deal with it.

Azami tosses her bat to Kate and tells her that she'll be playing for more information. Azami grabs a ball from the pitching machine and pitches the ball to Kate, who hits it. Azami tells her that this is what happens when you fight all the time -- she's gotten stronger. Azami tells her that she should stop putting all her stock in a warlock pact.

Kate responds that she's never wanted to do good by anything like this before. Azami asks if she's willing to do it with borrowed power. Kate says yes, and she's never been as scared as when Azami took the sword from her. Azami asks about the shard. Kate says that's scary too, but it feels different. Like there's a bigger impact with the sword.

Azami tells Kate she was there when the sword was broken. She also tells Kate that only some people are allowed to know. Azami also tells her that she could've asked at any time. To the shard.

Moki

Both Moki's have drawn their weapons. The third Moki holds Skab's axe.

The trio argue over who's truly protecting who. The pair of Mokis are stating that the third Moki didn't help at all she never provides specifics on how she protected them.

The third Moki flashes memories of a dead Skab after being crushed into the Mokis minds. Followed by the passed out Skab in the theatre. And eventually how poorly the fight went under the mall for Moki.

Kate

Azami tells Kate she needs to attune to the shard to talk to it. Azami also tells her she's not giving it back. Azami also tells Kate she's glad she didn't pick the sword, as the answers are a lot more boring. After all, she doesn't want to know about the owner of the sword. She then follows up with if she's going to use borrowed power, she should at least make some of it her own.

Kate responds that she always viewed it as taking power away from the original owner of the sword -- her dad.

Azami asks again what Kate would rather know about. Something that would help, or dear old dad. Kate mulls over this and eventually tells Azami that she's fighting for more than just herself. So she'd rather learn about what would help. She can find out about her dad later.

Azami asks if Kate knows why the sword was split in the first place. Kate responds with the cover-up answer taught in schools. Azami tells her that's wrong -- it's not just a sword. It's a key to something that could've wiped out entire continents.

Kate takes a seat as Azami explains. She notices the sky is clear and extremely starry.

Azami continues: The sword is from a time when Gods walked the material plane. The sword was the key to a fortress the size of a nation, which was capable of destroying the gods if they ever got out of hand. Thus, the New Monarchy intended to enact this fortress to take out the species they thought irrelevant

If gods used to walk the material plane, where are they now?

Kate responds that they're on other planes.

Azami responds asking about Gilgamesh. She informs Kate that Gilgamesh was the wargod of the material plane. There's one for the heavens and another for the hells. But they're not seen anymore.

A thought occurs to Kate, that she's only ever messed with the hells. Azami then asks why none of them ever walk the material plane to this day, especially if the weapon is no longer operable.

What makes a god?

Kate has no response.

Azami answers faith. Belief. These are what make someone a god.

Kate asks if Santa Claus is a god. Azami responds that he is a chaotic fey. She also mentions that she was just in high school after being called out to having met him and suddenly having this question. Azami flicks her in the forehead.

Moki

The Mokis hit initiative.

Yokai Moki opens with a divine smite and Moki opens with a psychic lance, but it's caught by the third Moki who uses it against Yokai Moki, which she saves and is not affected.

Their battle rages on, and eventually normal Moki deals the finishing blow, killing her other self, which dissipates and reveals Hitomi, who falls to the ground. The two Mokis head to her to help her up. She says she's fine.

Kate

Azami flicks her head once again. Kate says that she was a civilian before all this, which is why so much of this is going over her head.

Azami asks Kate to think about it, why the gods aren't walking among the material plane again. Kate responds that she questions whether it's that they can't, or that they won't. Azami tells her it's a little bit of both.

Kate draws upon putting stock in Asmodeus, thinking on how everyone she knows from the hells is able to walk among the material plane too.

Azami reveals that the same thing that cast Asmodeus out from the hells is also what caused the gods to leave the material plane. She's also told that the something can be as simple as a person. Kate's boss -- her new boss.

They're afraid of people like her new boss. People who overstep into their domain.

Azami also mentions that the space is finite, and that the gods still need believers. They still require their food.

Kate seems fearful about the prospect of messing with Gods. Azami questions why not mess with them. But Kate, while she's wanted to be something bigger, she fears something of this scale, it's a territory not to be messed with.

Strands form from Kate's weapon as if they're reaching towards Kate. She pulls back.

Kate asks one more question, she holds her sword sideways and asks if when Azami looks at her sword if the sword looks like it's alive to her.

Azami tells Kate to try to smite her again. The strands expand and heat to the smite Kate usually uses. As she swings, she feels how her weapon is so tied to her. She also feels for the first time ever how her own magic feels, as it flows through her body. Kate also feels the malleability of her pact.

Azami catches the blade once more. The strands where the blade makes contact with her hands are unwound, as if she knew the strands were there to begin with.

Kate takes the lesson that she could be stronger. Azami congratulates her for taking the first step on trespassing into her domain.

Kate comes to the conclusion that it's best to hold onto the shards to make sure that people who would use it for ill will wouldn't have access to it.

Kate sword shadowboxes to practice her form

Eventually, everyone wakes up Kate checks Moki over for wounds. Sebasios gives Kate a pamphlet informing her of contract renegotiations. The note says that due to new management, employee retention is down, but she's still being offered her position as warlock. Inside, it has two tickets to the re-negotiation, with a third one in a flap addressed to Moki. The letter was signed L

Moki discusses what happened to her, the third Moki they had to fight, and the likely reason for her existence.

The conversation shifts back to the re-negotiations and Moki questions why she was invited at all, having not been involved in any contract or pact with the hells. She then picks up on the signature, recognizing the same one from the Canadian flag she had on her Coke back at The Coven's bar.

Kate, Moki, and Sebasios take tickets to Kate's re-negotiation. They warp with infernal magic held in th tickets, and they're taken to pitch black darkness. Moki pulls her phone out to get light in the area, she sees Clare in the darkness with a party popper.

Clare pops it and yells surprise as stage lights flash on revealing them on a stage with a banner saying "Happy contract re-negotiation!"